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By April 2028, I won’t need to write this kind of article. If the International Olympic Committee updates its recently announced ‘AI Agenda’ ahead of the LA Games, your personal digital assistant will be able to quickly summarize the announcement, pull out three interesting tidbits relevant to your personal and professional interests (it’ll know you learn best in sets of three), and even—if you want—speculate a bit on where the technology might go next.
For now, though, you’re stuck with little old human me. But stick around. Please. The computers are watching.
Less than a year after assembling a working group of 18 athletes and experts to focus on artificial intelligence’s potential impact in sport, the IOC has now outlined how it intends to use the tool.
It’s instructive to think about AI (or machine learning models more specifically) as capable puzzle solvers, given enough training. Those puzzles can range from beating world champions at chess to sufficiently translating an essay to generating an image that could reasonably be confused with a photo of you standing atop an Olympic podium.
Humans’ job, then, is to figure out which puzzles are worth handing off to the machines. The IOC has identified several such problems it believes can be tackled, starting with talent identification.
Working with Intel, Olympics representatives in Senegal recorded 1,000 children from five villages performing basic track maneuvers. Intel’s chief commercial officer Christoph Schell said the company’s tool identified 40 young athletes who stood out from the rest. Models were then used to suggest which discipline each might be best suited for.
Taking that process a step further, AI guides could measure the youngsters’ progress, recommend training routines and diets to maximize their development, or even design custom equipment to complement their strengths.
Of course, this kind of automated strategy risks removing the main joys kids find in sports at a time when the professionalization of youth games is already being blamed for a 70% dropout rate by age 13. Olympic glory shouldn’t be a teenager’s main motivation. What would be left for the other 960 Senegalese children?
Recognizing these risks, IOC president Thomas Bach has repeatedly stressed his organization’s commitment to pursuing responsible technology development, though the competitive nature of national sport governing bodies makes any such attempt significantly more complicated.
As soon as this summer, computer vision tools will be tracking Olympic performances to help both event judges and spectators. Rather than evaluating a diver’s attempt by the size of their splash, viewers could soon see the exact angle at which they entered the water, for instance.
Overall, AI technology might have the biggest initial impact on the fan experience, where numerous challenges continue to vex broadcasters.
“We think the holy grail and the future of AI is to solve our greatest conundrum, which is: The viewer wants to know, ‘How can I easily find what I’m looking for?’” NBC Olympics producer Molly Solomon said at the IOC event, standing on a stage that could’ve been an AI-generated interpretation of recent Google product announcement venues. “We’re going to get there very soon.”
With events airing across six channels as well as the Peacock streaming service, it’s easy to see the allure in one day being able to sit on the couch and ask aloud to be shown the two most exciting live events in which Americans have a chance to medal.
Already, Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) is planning to use computerized generation tools to create a near infinite array of highlight clips based on sport, country and the combination thereof. OBS CEO Yiannis Exarchos also expressed excitement about the explanatory power of AI to guide neophytes during, say, high stakes fencing, badminton, or kayaking action, no matter the language they speak.
“We need to be using technology to tell the stories of the best athletes in the world in the most exciting ways,” he said in an interview. “The Olympics is not about showcasing technology. It’s about bringing people together.”
Ultimately, it’s impossible to predict just what impact advanced machine learning tools might have. They could lead to an era of undetectable performance enhancing supplements that threaten entire record books. Or maybe monitoring programs will have the opposite effect, identifying anomalies quickly and leading to cleaner contests.
In 2021, the IOC updated the Olympic motto.
“Faster, higher, stronger” was joined by “together.” In the original Latin, the new slogan is “Citius, Altius, Fortius — Communiter.”
Soon enough, a new addition, “Sapientior,” might be fitting as well. Need a translation? You know who—or rather, what—to ask.
